


Give/Take

by SuedeScripture



Category: Actor RPF, Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Magical Realism, Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-10
Updated: 2012-07-10
Packaged: 2017-11-10 06:26:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/463210
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuedeScripture/pseuds/SuedeScripture
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for Monaboyd Month 2012 on Livejournal</p>
            </blockquote>





	Give/Take

I knew there was something about Dom from the moment I met him. _Of course you did_ , you say. That’s how these stories always go, right? But it’s true. He was bright and cheerful and quick with a line, but it wasn’t just that. Dom’s got this… _magic_ about him, for lack of a better word. Not the word he’d put to it either. Some sort of thing that draws people to him, makes him sort of irresistible. It’s only taken me a decade and then some to figure out what it is. And what it isn’t.

He’s outside with Jack in the drive of our little house, out with Jack’s new bike, the first without training wheels. Jack’s keen on it, like any self-respecting six-year-old, and oh, does he love Dom. Unconditionally, like a big brother, or a second father, if you like. Yeah, yeah, go on about that, I know you lot do. But just the same, my boy’s pretty taken with him, and that’s alright.

It’s when I hear Jack’s sudden loud cry—which I ought to have expected, first time on a two-wheeler—that I see it. I ought to be out there taking video and not inside checking emails anyway, and when I get to the window, I see Dom with his hand over Jack’s knee and he looks… he looks remarkable.

There’s no describing it, what he’s doing, not doing anything but examining a bloodied knee, is he? But when he blinks, Jack isn’t crying anymore. Dom pulls him up and dusts him off, tilts the little blue bike back to vertical, but Jack trots off towards the bushes instead. Dom watches with some odd mix of his buoyant happiness and something else, glancing back toward the house and then all around the street, scrubbing his palm over his chin and hair like he’s committed some petty crime. He’s sweating, a sheen over him in the sun, and as Jack chases after bugs, Dom abandons the bike in the drive and sits cross-legged in the lawn, taking deep, heavy breaths while he watches over my son. It’s been a long time since I’ve thought of that magic about him, something that’s maybe less in the figurative sense, something truly preternatural. It’s something I’ve been privy to once before. Just once.

Night has fallen now, Ali’s out on the town with some of her friends, and I’ve put Jack down for bed, none the worse for wear. There’s not a mark on him as I get him into pajamas, despite taking a spill on the cement. That little bike is parked in the foyer off the living room with a bit of a scuff on its chrome, telltale signs of a tumble that should have left a scar.

“What did you do today, Dom?” I ask him as we eat takeaway in the living room, more matter-of-factly than I feel about it. It doesn’t matter, though, Dom knows exactly what I mean, and avoids it accordingly.

“Oh shite,” he glances at my carton of noodles. “I guess I ordered the mild version. Sorry. We can trade if you want.”

“Don’t piss around it now,” I give him a look, but keep it curious, “What happened with Jack outside?”

Dom chews, looking at me pensively, swallows and sets his spicy peanut chicken on the coffee table, his hand fluttering up to his ear to tug like he always does when he’s nervous. I could let this go, ask if it was just a wee spill, nothing to worry about, but I know better than that. It’s a lie he’s told before.

I set down my carton of food as well and wriggle the fingers on my right hand, theatrically, showing him how they all work just fine. I close my fist and open it again, and bend my arm at the wrist and elbow, twisting it round freely. You’d never think anything traumatic had ever happened to it. I can see it in Dom’s eyes that he remembers, going faraway. Into a past that we both remember, although I suspect, him maybe better than me.

So let’s do that, go back in time for a bit, then. It’s summer, it’s New Zealand, you all know the story by now. We’re working hard and playing harder. We’d a few days off, which was no small deal, four of us getting more than a day off at a time, all together. Surfing was by far the greatest activity mankind had invented. We—being Elijah, Orlando, Dom and myself—had driven up the coast. We’d heard from a few of the Lyall Bay locals about this amazing secluded beach that had some of the greatest waves you’ve ever seen, here’s how you get there, but you’ll need to camp out because it’s that inaccessible. You need a four wheel drive vehicle, and you’ll never find the way in or out by night, and not to tell a soul.

It was like following a treasure map, finding this place. Take the country roads to this four-by-four path marked only by a twisted kauri tree, drive until the path ends at a creek, then leave the Jeep and follow a footpath another mile or two, climb the hill to a rock shaped like a bunny rabbit and go in through the arsehole... you get the idea.

But we did find it, and it was absolutely everything they said it was. We surfed all day that day, catching wave after wave. It was one of the best days of my life down there. Until it was one of the worst.

I caught this monster of a wave, way out in the surf. I got up on my feet as it crested and… you know the videos of master surfers inside this tube of water? It was just like that. My heart was pounding out of my chest, I was yelling, I could hear the lads yelling and whooping. I felt like a giant, a god. Right up until I went down. The water smacked me in the face, churning all around, no air at all. My board crashed against me, and me against something hard and jagged, and that’s when I felt my hand and my arm explode. I could hear water bubbling, breaking, swirling and crashing, and I couldn’t breathe, and then I heard Dom.

“Bill! Oi, come on,” his voice was loud and strong, and his arms were even stronger. I tried to cling onto him, but I was a mess.

“Easy, Bills, I’ve got you,” he told me as he swam, holding me fast. Dom’s a good strong swimmer, and I’ll be grateful for that until I die.

“Think my arm’s broken,” I said, choking on seawater.

He didn’t say anything else, just swam hard, until I glimpsed Orlando, up to his shoulders in the surf, and Elijah up to his knees behind him, his hands clutching at his hair looking terrified.

“Shit, he’s bleeding!”

“Shut up, Lij,” Dom said, hauling me up onto shore. Things are a bit hazy here, my head going in and out, and I could taste copper and salt, but I remember hearing them all arguing around me, Orlando and Elijah sounding panicked and Dom sounding more authoritative than I’ve ever heard him, before or since.

“We have to call Pete. Fuck, we’re deep in the shit now,” Orlando said. “There’s no bloody service. How are we meant to get a fucking medic out here?”

“You drove up that trail of boulders and you think a fucking ambulance is going to zoom right on up?”

“Well, none of us were supposed to get smashed to bits, were we?”

“Oh God, look at his hand! His fingers are all fucking—”

“Get the fuck away,” Dom growled, “Fuck off, Lij! If you’re going to puke, go somewhere else.”

“We need to get him to hospital!”

“Yeah? How? You saw the way in, man, there’s no way we can get him out of here, the sun’s already going down!”

“Will you two fucking shut it and calm down, alright? He can hear you. He’s…” I opened my eyes to a pink-streaked sky and Dom, hovering over me, his fingers brushing my face and my lips. I licked them and tasted sand and blood. Dom’s voice went low and soothing, his eyes nearly purple, “Shh, easy, Bills.”

“Hurts.”

“I bet it does. Just be still right now.” He put his hand on my chest, looking over his shoulder at the others. “Look, it’s not as bad as it looks. We just need to clean him up. We brought a first-aid kit, right? You two go get some firewood and water. Fresh water from that little stream we passed.”

“Not as bad as it looks?” came Orli’s incredulous voice, “Dom, his whole arm, man—”

“Go get some fucking firewood,” Dom interrupted, his voice sharp and assertive, “Will you? He’s not dying, but he might if we stand around fucking talking about it. We need to boil some water and clean him up, so do it! Now!”

They must have done, because after this it went quiet. I could hear the ocean, the constant crash of those waves against the rocks, the calls of seabirds. It was peaceful, really, after so much chaos. And it was cold, so cold. I could hear Dom moving around me on the beach for some minutes before he came back to my side.

“Billy, sorry, but I need you to move. Let's get you in your sleeping bag and warm up now.”

I nodded, and though it took a monumental effort and hurt something fierce, he helped me to one of the little pop-tents we’d brought. I won’t lie, just moving twenty feet or so took every bit of energy out of me. I knew, even without having heard my friends that I’d done something really bad to my whole arm and hand. I was afraid to look down and see, but it didn’t feel right at all.

I don’t remember Dom cutting my wetsuit to get it off me. All I know is that it was gone the next time I opened my eyes, cocooned in warm fleece and looking up at blue nylon and his face. He glanced out of the tent and then back, looking scared, his eyes round and searching, mouth open, his hands fluttering between rubbing his chin and tugging at his ears.

“’S bad, isn’t it?” I asked him.

“Yeah, it’s bad,” he smiled tightly, darting another look out of the tent and back, rubbing his hands together, “Billy, I’m going to do something. I don’t know how much longer they’ll be gone.”

“What?”

“Shh. I’m going to do something, and I need you to be still,” He put one hand on my forehead and the other on my shoulder, the heat of his palms intense as he breathed, “Be so still, Billy.”

I wish I could rightly describe what happened next. I could feel the blood rushing around in my head, all over my body, and the pain and heat intensified, my vision bright behind my eyelids. But then, slowly, it all drew away, leaving my whole body rushing with that same feeling I got catching that amazing wave. I remember opening my eyes to Dom’s face, covered in sweat and breath heaving like he’d just run a marathon. His palm peeled from my forehead and brushed my face. “’S better now,” was all he said, and then he stumbled out of the tent.

And it was better. There were still injuries. My whole right side was battered, and there was something still off with one of my fingers, but that sureness I’d had back in the ocean, when Dom was hauling me back in and I knew without a doubt that the bones in my arm weren’t right, that was gone. As the guys came back and Dom mopped me up with one of his clean t-shirts and wrapped the worst of the scrapes, I could feel him probing my arm, feeling the bones beneath the muscle. They were whole.

The next morning we found our way out, back to civilization, and stopped at a clinic in the first decent-sized town we came to. Aside from bruises, scrapes and one broken pinkie finger, I was fine. Elijah and Orlando were dumbfounded and elated, quick with miracle jokes and quicker with thanks that Pete wouldn’t have reason to skin us all alive. Dom didn’t say much. He was quieter than normal, but he maintained that he knew I’d be fine.

But over a week of watching me closer than usual, especially as I tended to my broken finger that we were hiding from Pete, I wondered, pondering through all the scattered memories I had of that day, at what Dom had done. I didn’t really believe it. Thought I had dreamed it for a while.

Then, over time, with the whirlwind and exhaustion of filming, the magic of New Zealand and Weta, and the subsequent insanity of promoting the fucking thing and everything that happened in my life afterward, I eventually put it right out of my mind.

For twelve long years. Until today.

Dom comes to some sort of decision where he’s sat in my armchair, nodding to himself and reaching out his hand. I give him mine and watch as he feels the bones through my skin, the same way he’d done that day, all those years ago. “Does it ever hurt?”

“No. That finger twinges a bit sometimes, but not the rest.”

He swallows and sits back, looking at me with those intense, amazing eyes of his, a little afraid, folding his own fingers nervously in front of his mouth.

“I won't tell anyone,” I tell him softly. “You know that.”

“I know,” he murmurs, hesitating for a time before he speaks again. “Still counts though.”

My heart flips over, to hear him say it, admit he’d really done something weird, something unbelievable that night. It confirms I’m not crazy, at least. My own best mate. “You’re an X-man.”

He snorts sardonically, sitting back in the chair and shaking his head with little humor. Always quick with a joke is Dom, but now he’s serious as a hurricane. His knee bounces. He mutes the telly and darts his eyes at me and away again. “You aren’t supposed to know. I thought you wouldn’t remember. I broke the rules with you.”

“Whose rules?” I ask, and try to lighten this, “What, Dom? Angels? Aliens? The Superhero Control Coalition, what?”

Dom shrugs, “It doesn’t matter, does it? The point is some people can do things. And the rest of you can’t. Some people are meant to push the world in certain directions, and others are supposed to follow. Only sometimes it doesn’t work out. People aren’t meant to know.”

“So, you heal people? That’s your thing?” He just looks at me. “Well, fuck, what about all the Indian gurus and faith preachers and shite, are they…?”

“They’re mostly bollocks. A few are real, though… it depends.”

“But we know about them, they put them on TV specials, right after Kate Plus 8 and World’s Fattest Mom and the like.”

Dom counters, “But it’s not real to you, sitting there on your settee watching, is it? Some people do it for fame and money, so you can bet they’re fake. There are rules. It isn’t to be used for personal gain.”

I consider that and shrug, “You’re famous.” He smiles faintly, and I push, “You are! More famous that some guru, and a few of your co-stars, I might add. The paparazzi shoot me half out of frame, you’re such a great big deal. You… You made Rings successful, didn’t you?” I suddenly start to think about it, “It’s all your bloody fault.”

“I didn’t do that,” he says, looking away.

“The grand influencer,” I grin, thinking about church as a lad. “I wonder which side you’re playing for.”

Dom gives me half a laugh, rolling his eyes. “Think Treebeard. I’m not on any side, Billy. Anyway, Rings didn’t need any help. I was… being selfish. I’m still selfish. I didn’t ask for this, you know. It’s just what I am.”

“So you’re the reluctant magic man who’d rather be a famous Hollywood actor?”

“Something like that,” he said, expelling a big breath. “Although they make damn sure I don’t get away with being rebellious.”

“Do they?” I ask, still wondering whoever ‘they’ are, “I don’t know, you seem like you’re doing pretty well for yourself.”

“Am I?” He says darkly, “Sure, I’m allowed to play at being normal, but it comes with consequences.”

“Consequences,” I parrot.

“Come on, Bills.” Dom says, “You don’t think having some miraculous power doesn’t come with a price?”

I don’t know what to say to that. Sounds like Spider-Man and Mary Jane.

“I don’t go around healing the sick, and curing cancer and being Mother fucking Theresa, because what’s the point? People do and believe whatever they want, and that’s fine. I don’t want to influence people that way. I never did. So I don’t. I decided to be selfish and do what I wanted. To live my own life.”

He shifts in his seat, twisting a ring around, his voice bitter. “And there have been consequences, haven’t there? I don't get leads. My parts get cut, I get killed off, women leave me, my shows get cancelled. They’ve made damn sure I can only get so far.

“And the one time I did what they wanted me to,” he murmurs down at his hands, his voice going odd, “The one time I thought I was being selfless, and healing someone who needed it… well, they made damn sure I paid for that too.”

“What, Dom,” I whisper, “What did you pay?”

“Don’t be fucking daft,” he answers, looking back at me with those incandescent eyes, “You know what.”

I sit back against the sofa, staring at him, watching him mop a hand over his face and pick up his carton of food again, poking at it with chopsticks but not really eating any more.

I’m pretty sure I know what he means. He only tells me every day, and reminds the rest of you often enough that you don’t forget. Still writing naughty stories about us on the internet, right? It’s a fun laugh, isn’t it? Only it isn’t. Sure, we carried on and played it up all those years ago. Sure, lines got blurred here and there. But as much as he’s still the very best of my mates, I love my wife and my boy and my life as it is. And I do love Dom, that will never change. I’ve just… sort of learned to ignore it over so many years. And that makes me seem a huge prick.

“Why…” I start, choosing my words carefully, “If that’s the way of it, if there’s a cost to be paid… what about Jack? Why would you do that for nothing more than a scraped knee?”

“Because I’m an idiot,” Dom shifts back to me, looking terribly guilty. “Mostly because I can’t take him crying, it hurts me right here,” he thumps his knuckles to his chest and gives a heavy sigh, “I was sort of hoping they’d give it a pass, but. Obviously not.”

“How do you know they didn’t?”

“You’re asking, aren’t you?” he says, looking up at me in defeat, and then beyond me. “What’s up, Jackie Boy?” Dom asks, and I follow his gaze to the stairs.

“I had a bad dream,” Jack says from the landing, his pajamas rumpled and a streak of a tear down his cheek.

“That’s no good,” Dom says seriously, getting up and taking Jack’s hand, leading him back up to his room, “Tell me about it and we’ll see which monsters I’ll have to give a talking to.”

I’m left sitting in my living room, the muffled rumble and rise of Dom’s voice and my son’s giggles trickling down from the upstairs. I look down at my arm and hand, perfect and whole. What if Dom hadn’t done what he did for me all those years ago? Would I still have everything I have now? I’d never be able to play in my band. Probably wouldn’t get many of the roles I’ve had either. I try to figure out how I fit in this strange world without him, this life he’s helped to give me. How my best mate in it has to live, right on the edges of everything he deserves, able to see and touch but never call his own.

“It’s not fair,” I say out loud, to whoever they are, if they listen to mere mortals who happen to have experienced Dom as he really is, magic man or not. No one answers.

Fuck that. I head up the stairs, just as Dom is leaving Jack’s room and closing the door behind him without a sound.

"Jack was awake," I say, "When you did it. You didn't hide it from him."

Dom drops his gaze to the carpet. "Kids understand. They accept until they're taught not to."

I nod. "And _they_ give that a pass?"

He says nothing, avoiding my eyes.

“I’ve never known you to play by anyone’s rules. Or at least not challenge the ones you don’t like,” I tell him.

“Thought I had done,” he says, his face resigned in the dim of the upstairs hallway.

“What if I do it, then? What if I accept it, like a kid?” I ask, and he looks back at me with sad, skeptical eyes.

Dom shrugs, glancing down the stairs like he’s looking to escape from me. And that’s not the Dom I know at all.

I grab him by the front of his shirt and kiss him. It takes him a second to react; it’s been quite a long time since I’ve done this, after all. But he reacts. Not exactly the way he used to, not the show, the bit for the audience. His hands come up and grip my shoulders and his lips drop away mine on a whimper as his knees give out, and I catch him up against me, my left arm tight round his ribs.

Just the left, you see. A sharp, electric twinge fires its way down my right.


End file.
